Detroit museums eager to profit when big game comes

A MODEL-T leaves a replica of the Ford Motor Co. at Greenfield Village in Dearborn, Mich. Visitors to the 40th edition of the Super Bowl will have several entertainment venues available for visiting.

DETROIT -- The Tuesday before the Super Bowl, HBO cameras will pan across the shiny treasures at the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, Mich., capturing perhaps a Model T or a Lincoln limousine.

It will all be for football, for Super Bowl XL, and in this case, for "HBO: Inside the NFL."

But it means millions of viewers across America will get to glimpse Michigan's largest cultural attraction.

"When you look at HBO, oh my God, the exposure, it's just tremendous," said Wendy Metros of the Henry Ford.

The Henry Ford, like several metro Detroit cultural institutions, has plunged into the Super Bowl spirit. Like area hotels and restaurants and residents eager to rent out their homes for a nice profit, museums are hoping to make money and be noticed by an influx of media and about 100,000 out-of-towners.

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A MUSEUM VOLUNTEER points out a small detail on the industrial murals painted by Diego Rivera at the Detroit Institute of Arts. For Super Bowl visitors, the Detroit Institute of Arts will offer an educational experience outside the nighttime recreational opportunities like the city's Winter Blast, NFL Experience and the casinos. Photos by CARLOS OSORIO, The Associated Press

"We didn't base our 2006 budget on the Super Bowl, but if we get more visitors, then great," said Denise Thal, the museum's chief financial officer.

A study done for the Detroit Super Bowl XL Host Committee predicted the event would bring $302 million to southeastern Michigan. While the report did not specify the financial gains for cultural centers, some local museum officials have said their institutions will make tens of thousands of dollars from rentals and extra visitors.

The New Detroit Science Center alone will take in more than $50,000 from renting itself out for Super Bowl parties, one of which will honor Detroit Lions great Barry Sanders and another will be hosted by former basketball superstar Magic Johnson.

Faced with tighter budgets and declining daily attendance, even museums with highbrow reputations cannot let the Super Bowl pass without trying to capitalize on its popularity.

The Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History has rolled out "Gridiron to Greatness: African Americans in Professional Football," which tells the story of and shows off memorabilia from such football stars as Robert Porcher (who will host a Super Bowl party there) and Sanders (who is to be honored at a Super Bowl Party at the New Detroit Science Center next door).

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THE MOTOWN Historical Museum in Detroit is seen Thursday. It chronicles the music company that transformed artists into superstars. By PAUL SANCYA, The Associated Press

A few hundred feet away, the Detroit Institute of Arts is trying out "The Super 'Bowl' Show: Still Life Prints, Drawings, Photographs and Vessels," a pun of an exhibit featuring 20 variations of the bowl, as well as 100 drawings and lithographs by such artists as Diego Rivera and Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec. The DIA's most publicized exhibit of 2005, "Camille Claudel and Rodin: A Fateful Encounter," with sculptures by Claudel and Auguste Rodin, runs until Super Bowl Sunday.

But will Super Bowl fans care about culture?

That it's even a question perplexed Sue Anne Klinefelter, 50, and her former college roommate, Deb Lange, 50, of Fenton, Mich., as they walked toward a bus bound for the Ford Rouge Factory Tour at the Henry Ford on a windy winter Friday.

"Sure, football fans can have culture as well," Lange insisted. "They encompass a lot of different kinds of people."

Added Klinefelter: "They're not one-dimensional sports heads."

The area's financially battered cultural institutions hope to attract visitors like Klinefelter and Lange, but museum leaders are realistic about the Super Bowl's potential impact.

"We're talking about a few thousand visitors at a time that we're normally not so busy, but it's a small thing, really," DIA director Graham Beal said of the big game.

David Allardice, who led the eight-month economic impact study for the Detroit Super Bowl XL Host Committee, said the length of visitors' stays is critical for Detroit's cultural institutions and businesses.

"The worst scenario would be if they come into town on Saturday night and left on Sunday evening," said Allardice, associate dean of Lawrence Technological University's College of Management.

Jordy Tollett, president and chief executive officer of the Houston Convention and Visitors Bureau, which was heavily involved in the 2004 Super Bowl, estimated that the city's cultural organizations took in $2 million to $3 million during Super Bowl week, including 19 percent of a hotel occupancy tax that goes to the arts.

In Jacksonville, last year's Super Bowl host city, the 98,000-square-foot Cummer Museum of Art and Gardens saw a modest increase of about 1,000 to 2,000 visitors during Super Bowl XXXIX and brought in more than $10,000 from hosting three corporate events, according to museum director Maarten van de Guchte.

But what de Guchte called "the most important aspect" was the attention of the media, which meant readers of USA Today could learn of the Cummer and its 5,000 works.

The science center could receive that kind of national media attention when it welcomes Sanders to the Runners of the Game: 1st Annual Super Celebration and Magic Johnson to a viewing party called Player's Paradise VII two days later.

The DIA will also show itself off when ABC and ESPN rent it for a party the evening before the Super Bowl.

And the Wright Museum hopes for publicity when it hosts a reunion of the 1972 Miami Dolphins, the only team in the National Football League that boasts an undefeated season, including a Super Bowl win.

The money isn't bad either.

The Henry Ford will earn $50 to $250 per person during catered corporate events leading up to the Super Bowl, and the Detroit Historical Museum, which is in negotiations with the city to transfer operations to the Detroit Historical Society in order to stay open, expects to gain more than $15,000 from five days of parties.